


What Good is the Moonlight

by circ_bamboo



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates, Threesome - F/M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-02
Updated: 2014-06-02
Packaged: 2018-02-03 04:11:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1730684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/circ_bamboo/pseuds/circ_bamboo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On his thirteenth birthday, Tony Stark wakes up with a name on his chest <em>and</em> a name on his shoulder.</p>
<p>Fortunately, so do Rhodey and Pepper.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Good is the Moonlight

**Author's Note:**

> Riffing off of [this](http://darkmistandodddreams.tumblr.com/post/84565620050/i-need-more-polyamory-soulmate-au-in-my-life) Tumblr post about polyamory soulmate AUs. Thanks to feels-like-fire for a beta, and also to superishdude for offering, even if apparently our timing (and possibly Tumblr's messaging system) were off.
> 
> Title from [here](http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/paulmccartney/wethreemyechomyshadowandme.html) because I have a terrible sense of humor.

Howard Stark didn't believe in soulmates.

The name over his heart said _Maria Carbonell_ , and the name on Tony's mother's shoulderblade said _Howard Stark_ , but since science still had no idea how to explain soulmates or soul-names, Howard Stark refused to believe in them and pretended that he'd just married Maria as a coincidence.

So Tony Stark didn't believe in soulmates. He especially didn't believe in them when he woke up on the morning of his thirteenth birthday with his chest _and_ his shoulderblade burning. Two names? Who got _two_ soulmates? What if the other two people weren't soulmates with each other? Worse, what if they were and they decided they didn't need him?

The one on his back was a woman's name, Virginia Potts, and the one on his chest was a man's name, James Rhodes. The woman's name was weird enough. Who named their kid Virginia in this day and age? But the man's name: James Rhodes was the governor of Ohio, and had been the governor who called out the National Guard on the kids from Kent State a few weeks before Tony had been born. Tony really hoped to God that it wasn't the same guy.

But he had so many _questions_. Was it still okay if he found one of them but not the other? What if they found each other first? Did he even want to be soulmated with another boy?

The answer to that last question was an unqualified _yes_ , as he would figure out at boarding school the next year, but boarding school was boring as hell so he petitioned his father just to send him straight to MIT.

MIT was way more fun; he got to blow stuff up without getting in trouble. (Well, not _too_ much trouble.) He started building robots, and was trotting around to find a field so he could set off a rocket when he walked by the ROTC or maybe just some overgrown Boy Scouts doing drills.

Not drills yet, to be fair; they were taking roll, and Tony stopped to watch for a moment.

"REESE, WILLIAM!" the instructor yelled, and a skinny young man with a buzz cut stepped forward.

"Present, sir!"

"RESSLER, JASON!"

"Present, sir!"

Another skinny white guy with a buzz cut stepped forward. Tony shook his head and started walking again.

"RHODES, JAMES!"

... and then stopped dead in his tracks. No. What were the odds?

His brain calculated them quickly in the back and when it got past 1 in 4 million he stopped paying attention. He turned to look, and even though they were onto ROJAS, BENJAMIN, he could still see RHODES, JAMES, standing with his hands straight at his sides.

He was black, which Tony hadn't expected, and then he felt like a racist asshole for not expecting that. Then again, his dad, who was definitely of the good-enough-for-friends-not-good-enough-to-marry school, would flip his _shit_.

That, in and of itself, was enough to make Tony find a nearby park bench and watch the rest of the afternoon's drills. He at least had a pen and a pad of paper with him, so he could amuse himself by calculating things that he really didn't need to calculate.

Well, and also to distract himself, so he wouldn't just leave. Hell, he was all of fifteen, and the guy up there was probably eighteen or twenty or more. And, well, not everyone was thrilled to meet their soulmate. What if--

\--nope nope nope. He scribbled down a set of variables and, just for fun, put them through a Fourier transformation. The results meant nothing, but he didn't care.

"DIS-MISSED!" couldn't have come soon enough; Tony had covered six legal-sized sheets of paper in tiny, cramped manuscript, and had almost talked himself out of doing nothing. Not quite, though, and he had no idea what spurred him forward other than sheer cussedness, but he stood up, scanned the crowd until he found James Rhodes, shouldered his backpack, and took off to follow him.

James Rhodes was walking with some other guy, one of the zillions of skinny white dudes, and Tony hung back for a couple of blocks, hoping that other guy would disappear. But he didn't, and right before James Rhodes disappeared into his dorm, Tony finally grabbed up enough chutzpah and said, "Hey, Rhodes."

Rhodes turned, letting the other guy go ahead of him, and looked at Tony inquisitively. Before Tony could figure out what the hell to say now, Rhodes's eyes widened, and he said, "Holy shit. You're Anthony Stark."

"You're not the governor of Ohio," Tony said.

Rhodes stared for a moment and then laughed. "Nope."

Tony stuck a hand out. "Yeah, Tony, not Anthony. Does the name Virginia Potts mean anything to you?"

"Oh, _good_ ," Rhodes said, as he shook Tony's hand, "you too. I couldn't--I didn't know if it was all three of us, or just me, or what."

"Yeah, we're a trio," Tony said, his own relief making him almost light-headed. "So, uh, like, we don't have to do anything about this--I mean, we're both pretty young, but--do you want to get pizza sometime?"

"Aren't you all of fifteen, there, kid?" Rhodes asked, grinning.

"Oh, like you're massively older," Tony shot back.

"Old enough," Rhodes said loftily. "But yeah, pizza would be good. Not now. I have to shower, and what's that on your back, a rocket?"

"Oh, this? Yeah." Tony had forgotten about his backpack. He shrugged. "Later? Tomorrow? My extension is 5-2364."

"Yeah." Rhodes made a show of patting his pants pockets, and it took a moment for Tony to recognize that as a cue to hand Rhodes his pen. Rhodes wrote the number down and said, "I'll call you once I'm done. I think. Wait, no, I have a math test tomorrow. Tomorrow evening?"

"Sure," Tony said.

***

Jim Rhodes stood in front of Tony Stark's dorm room door, holding a large pepperoni pizza and contemplating his own bad decisions. He took a deep breath before he knocked. It was probably creepy, finding Tony’s unlisted dorm address, right? But Tony wouldn't answer his phone, and he'd said something about pizza, and they were soulmates anyway, so--

He knocked, and heard someone shuffling in the room. Tony was in there. A good five minutes passed, and he knocked again, willing to give it one more shot before he went back to his room and shared the pizza with his roommate. This time he heard footsteps coming over to the door, and then the door opened a crack.

"Hi," Jim said. "I looked you up in the student directory."

"I'm not in the student directory," Tony said, blinking. He looked even younger than he had before, brown eyes liquid in a too-pale face under the fluorescent lighting.

"Yeah, I know," Jim said, feeling his face grow hot, "but your phone number says you're in one of three buildings and I figured you had a single because you're young and then it was just a process of elimination." He shrugged. It hadn't even been all that difficult. "I brought pizza."

"Oh," Tony said. "Yeah. Come in?"

"Yeah," Jim said. He hesitated, because in addition to two and a half years, he had about six inches and probably fifty pounds on the boy, and he couldn't tell if Tony was afraid of him or afraid of something else. "We can leave the door open if it would make you feel better."

Tony stared at him blankly for a moment. "Why would that--oh." He turned red and looked to the side. "No, don't bother."

"Okay." Jim stepped in and let the door close behind him, setting the pizza on the corner of Tony's desk. "I hope you like pepperoni."

"Of course I like pepperoni. Who doesn't like pepperoni?"

Jim looked around Tony's room while Tony puttered around, looking for plates or something. It was cluttered with the usual teenage boy detritus, as well as a television, an Atari, a couple of other terminal computers, various circuit boards, and what looked like four rockets in various states of construction.

"Here." Tony thrust a paper towel in his direction, and Jim took it. He served himself a slice of pizza and then handed the box to Tony.

Awkward silence reigned, while Tony attempted to eat the entire slice of pizza in one bite and Jim ate in the usual fashion.

"Look," Jim said, when he couldn't stand it anymore. "We don't have to--the soulmate thing only means--you know I'm not gonna--"

Tony's eyes grew wide and he shook his head, cutting Jim off. "Can we start with the simple stuff first, like what's your middle name, before we plan out the rest of our lives?"

Jim stopped abruptly and blinked a couple of times. "Rupert."

"Edward," Tony said.

Jim found himself grinning, and Tony grinned back. "It's a start," Jim said.

***

"Mama, I found one of them today. Actually, he found me."

"Oh, no, it was the Stark boy, wasn't it? Is he the same one from the magazine?"

"Yeah, Mama, it's Tony Stark, Howard Stark's son."

Jim's mother clicked her tongue. "Well, that's going to be difficult."

"Yeah, it probably is."

"Rich white boys make everything difficult."

"Mama, I go to school with three thousand rich white boys."

"So you know how they do."

Jim laughed. "It's true."

"When are you gonna bring him home to meet me?"

"I don't know, Mama. When I can."

"Soon."

"Soon," he promised.

***

"What do you think Virginia Potts is like?" Tony asked the next time they met, for burgers this time.

Tony ate like a fifteen-year-old, wolfing down two burgers and more than his fair share of fries. Jim just shook his head and shoved the extra napkins his direction.

"I don't know," Jim said, when he'd finished chewing and swallowing. "Probably some nerdy white girl."

Tony sighed. "Oh well."

"Hey, you're a nerdy white boy. What are you complaining about a nerdy white girl for?"

"It's just _different_ ," Tony said.

"No, it isn't," Jim said. He leaned back in his chair and grinned. "Besides, I'm good-looking, you will be in a few years . . . I bet she's fine."

"A few _years_?" Tony squawked, and Jim grinned again.

***

Somehow over the next few months Jim became "Rhodey," although everyone else still called him Jim, and "Tony" acquired a particular note of exasperation that it would never lose.

And sometime after that, "like" turned into something more, and Rhodey walked around feeling like the worst sort of pervert. Of course, Tony was his soulmate, and the age of consent was sixteen if the names matched, but--no. He just--he couldn't. It was too weird.

"Eighteen?" Tony said, when the subject finally came up. "You won't touch me until I'm _eighteen_? I'll have a _degree_ by then."

"Tony," Rhodey said. "We'll have another eighty _years_ after that. Waiting another year and change won't hurt you."

"Says you," Tony said. "I'm pretty sure my balls are going to explode."

"Well, nothing's stopping you from doing something about it yourself."

And then, of course, the day that Tony _actually_ turned eighteen was the last day of exams, and even if Tony'd already finished his, Rhodey had a Combinatorics exam that morning. Tony thought he was going to die of sexual frustration for the full 24 hours that Rhodey made him wait, and was very vocal about it. Rhodey felt a little bad, but it was absolutely worth it.

"Oh, my God," Tony said afterwards, panting. "We could have been doing that _years_ ago."

"No, we couldn't, because I'm not gross," Rhodey said, rolling onto his back and pulling Tony on top of him, sweat, come, spit, lube and all. "A few months, maybe."

"You're just going to have to make it up to me," Tony said.

"Sure, Tony," Rhodey said. His fingertips idly found a series of bumpy lines on Tony's left shoulderblade--oh, right, the other name. Virginia Potts.

And come to think of it, as great as he felt, everything relaxed, every cell in his body still suffused with pleasure, there was a--hole, maybe? Not a hole, but an awareness that there was something missing, perhaps. Or that they were complete as they were, but it could be even better? Rhodey didn't have the words to describe it. "You feel it, too?" he asked.

"Yeah," Tony said. "Not that it wasn't--not that you weren't great, but--"

"I know," Rhodey said. 

A few minutes later, Tony poked Rhodey in the side. "So what's it like with a girl?"

"You haven't--? Of course you haven't, what am I saying," Rhodey said, shaking his head. "It's different. Mostly the same, though. Oh, man, I get to teach you how to eat pussy, though."

Tony's head lifted. "It's that much fun?"

"Yeah. Picture it: you, face-down between her legs, tongue deep in her twat, and me balls-deep inside you. Or me holding her in my arms while you make her scream. Or her riding your face while I'm--"

Tony stopped him with a kiss, squirming so he was fully on top of Rhodey, both of them starting to get hard again. "God, I hope we find her soon," Tony said, long minutes later.

"Yeah."

***

Six months later, Tony's parents died.

Rhodey stood next to him at the funeral, Obadiah Stane on his other side where Virginia Potts should have been. Rhodey had only met the senior Starks once, at Tony's graduation, where Howard had quizzed him intently and had been strangely relieved to find out that Rhodey had two names as well, and that they matched. Nonetheless, he wouldn't have been anywhere else, and it was a relief to get back to MIT just after the new year and settle back into their apartment. Rhodey still had two years left in his aeronautics degree, and Tony figured he could finish a doctorate before his twenty-first birthday, when he'd inherit control of Stark Industries. Plus, that gave them three more years to search for Virginia Potts.

***

On her thirteenth birthday, Virginia "Pepper" Potts woke up with a burning shoulder and a burning left breast, and immediately ran to the mirror to see what they said. The front was easy--James Rhodes, in a looping script--but she had to angle a couple of mirrors to read the back, and even then it took her a while to decipher the angular handwriting. But once she had, a shiver ran down her spine. Anthony Stark. She knew that name, because five months ago, just before Christmas, his parents had died.

Two days later, a Saturday, she convinced her parents to let her ride the bus down to the University library so she could do research for her history report, or so she told them. Instead, she carefully taught herself how to use the microfilm machine so she could find all the news reports on Anthony Stark, dating back to a magazine article when he was six.

A bonus, though: one of the pictures from the funeral identified the young black man standing at Stark's side as a Mr. James Rhodes. Maybe that was her James Rhodes? Maybe it was all _three_ of them.

That was . . . that was weird. People didn't usually come in groups of three. She sat back in her chair and stared at the screen blankly for a moment. Well, what was the other option? Maybe she was soulmated to them both, but they weren't soulmated to each other. Maybe they were just friends, and they'd, well, share her. However exactly that worked. 

She felt her cheeks heat, but that didn't stop her from feeding coins into the machine to get a print of the picture with both of them in it. Folding it carefully, she tucked the paper inside her history notebook. She'd just have to keep paying attention.

***

Two and a half years later, on his twenty-first birthday, Tony Stark (she'd gathered that he went by 'Tony') took over Stark Industries. He almost instantly started making headlines, both for his innovations and also for his rather extravagant lifestyle.

Pepper wrinkled her nose as she read the latest gossip item, about him and some young actress getting caught in the back of a limo. It was good that soulmating wasn't permanent destiny, that she didn't _have_ to meet him--either of them--or marry them, ever, if she didn't want to. Her parents weren't soulmates; her dad didn't have a mark and her mother's said _John Johnson_ , which was not her dad's name at all. They were fine and happy.

Besides, she still might be able to find James Rhodes, if he wasn't the one from the funeral photo. 

Really, she should just avoid Tony Stark altogether.

Stark Industries was based in New York, so Pepper mostly applied for colleges on the West Coast. She got into Stanford, and her parents were so proud that they let her go. She declared a major in accounting and a minor in art history, and did very well.

And then Stark decided to move Stark Industries' HQ over to Malibu. That was . . . well, it was hours away, because California was a big state, but it was too close for her tastes. So she decided to apply for jobs on the East Coast. It wasn't rational, and she knew it, but she'd never lived in New York, and thought she ought to try.

But she didn't get a job from her first dozen interviews, and at that point she was almost thinking of applying to McDonald's, because her student loans would rapidly become due, and she couldn't ask her parents for any more money. So, reluctantly, she signed up with a temp agency.

The temp agency gave her a couple of short-term jobs, one in forensic accounting that she adored, one with a lawyer for a court case, and then told her that they had the perfect job for her. "You'd have to move, though," her contact said. "The job's in Malibu. I heard about it through our LA office."

"Oh," Pepper said. "I don't . . ." It couldn't be, could it?

"Yeah, Stark Industries just moved all their operations out here, so they're using a temp service to beef up some of their departments quickly. Good for us, huh? Here, look at the info sheet." She pushed a piece of paper across the desk to Pepper, and Pepper bent over to read it.

The contact was right. The job was exactly suited to her experience, as minimal as it was, and it paid, _oh_ , ten thousand dollars a year more than she'd expected, and that was with the salary artificially lowered because of the temp agency. She couldn't say no, she really couldn't.

Besides, what were the odds that the head of Stark Industries would have anything to do with a random accountant?

Nothing, as it turned out. She spent the first few weeks with butterflies in her stomach, but as the days went on and it turned out that Tony Stark wasn't even in the country part of the time, she relaxed a little more, and a little more. 

She moved from Accountant I to Accountant II to Accountant III in a little over four years; the next position was Accountant IV, which was actually a supervisory role, and there was no way she would be ready for it any time soon. The good news was that Accountant IIIs got to do some forensic accounting; not particularly deep but any time there was a discrepancy there was a chance that she would end up in a room with ream-paper boxes full of paper and an Excel spreadsheet and the exhortation to 'make it work.'

Yes, that was her idea of fun.

Pepper was pretty resolute about not taking work home with her, but one afternoon she caught a discrepancy on her own. It was--that money did not match that account number. It was similar, but not quite the same. (She'd memorized an embarrassing amount of account numbers.) Something struck her as super-odd about it, so she signed out a handful of files, said she was re-checking her numbers, and tucked them into her attache.

Eight hours later it was past midnight and she couldn't stop frowning. She still wanted to double-check her numbers, but she was 99.9% sure that _someone_ , and by 'someone' she meant 'most likely the VP of Finance,’ was stealing money from Stark Industries.

If the VP of Finance was involved, that meant she had to go over his head. There were only two people over his head, the CFO, one Obadiah Stane, and the CEO and owner of the company, Tony Stark.

She could, she supposed, go to the Board of Directors itself, but, well, she should try Stane or Stark first.

Except--she set her pen down and winced. She'd met Obadiah Stane once or twice, and she always got an icky feeling from him, like he was two sentences from something that would end in a sexual-harassment lawsuit.

She supposed Tony Stark had a similar reputation, but she'd never been around him, obviously. The problem, of course, was that if she _was_ , he'd ask her name, and find out that his soulmate had been hiding within reach for the last six years.

So. Of course, she still had to recheck all her numbers, but sexual harassment lawsuit, or give up her entire cover?

She'd chance the lawsuit. Maybe she could take one of the other accountants along with her.

***

It took Pepper nearly another week, but finally she had all of her ducks in order. She was absolutely certain that not only was the VP of Finance skimming cash, but she could prove it. She spent the entire weekend dithering as to whether she should go to Stane or just go to Stark, and at the end she'd decided to go with Stane, because it was easier. Of course, Monday morning, when she got in, she discovered that Stane had just left for Japan for two weeks, which meant she either had to wait--and let the VP get away with more money--or just go to Stark.

Could she somehow do it without telling him who she was? She could _try_ , she supposed.

She went to Stark's secretary, Mrs. Arbogast, and asked for an appointment; the woman was polite, but apparently Mr. Stark's schedule was booked solid for essentially the next year. "I have information that I need to give to him personally," Pepper said, and then bit her tongue; it sounded as if she were having an affair with him. "Information about someone embezzling."

"That should go through the VP of Finance, Ms. Potts," Mrs. Arbogast said. "I can give you his extension."

"No," Pepper said quickly. "I mean. No. That won't work."

Mrs. Arbogast was no fool; she frowned and said, "How about you go back to your desk, Ms. Potts, and I'll call you as soon as I can find a break in Mr. Stark's schedule. Hopefully it'll be in the next couple of days."

Pepper nodded. "Yes," she said. "Thank you so much."

But Mrs. Arbogast didn't call that day, or the next day, and by the time Friday rolled around and she still hadn't called, Pepper was getting frustrated. She managed to talk herself into going back up to see Mrs. Arbogast personally by eleven AM, and then backed down, giving her a quick phone call.

Mrs. Arbogast didn't answer the phone, though, and Pepper left a voice mail that went unanswered. At noon, she freshened her lipstick and went upstairs to try Mrs. Arbogast in person again.

Mrs. Arbogast was on the phone, and a woman that Pepper thought was probably Stark's PA was standing behind her looking at the computer screen. They didn't notice her at first, and there was a straight path to the door to Stark's actual office, so Pepper didn't even think, she just went straight over and opened the door.

It didn't occur to her until she was already standing in front of Stark's desk that he could have been busy, either with actual business or eating lunch or--something more personal--but he wasn't. Or, well, he might have been busy; he appeared to be reading over a report, but he looked up at her, frowning, when she spoke.

"Mr. Stark," she said, "one of your VPs is stealing money from you." She set down her stack of papers in front of him. "As you can see, money has been transferred from--"

"Wait, who are you?" Stark asked, glancing at the papers briefly.

"I work in Accounting," she said.

"Yes, but what's your name?" he said. He snapped his fingers at someone behind her, probably his PA, but Pepper didn't turn to look.

She did, however, purse her lips together, and said, "I'd rather not say." Before the words were even out of her mouth she knew that Stark wasn't going to accept that; he eyed her tag, and then looked down at the papers she'd set on his desk.

Shit. The printers at Stark Industries all included a tagline at the top with the user ID of the person who printed it, and she hadn't thought to remove it. So on every single sheet it said VPOTTS.

He was smart. Legendarily so. He'd figure it out in about three, two, one . . .

"Virginia Potts?" he said slowly.

She nodded, and tried as hard as she could not to cry. She'd known it was coming, but it was still difficult.

Stark's face transformed from serious and a little angry to bewilderment to sheer wonder in under a second, and then he held up a hand to whoever was behind her. "Elena, take these numbers, look them over with Mrs. Arbogast; you have a degree in finance, don't you? Anyway, send Security to escort Wilcox to a secure room and let him stew there for a while."

Elena nodded, picked up the stack of papers, and left the room, leaving Pepper and Tony Stark alone for the first time.

"Why are you afraid of me?" he asked.

"I'm not afraid of you," she said, standing up straighter. She wasn't. She was afraid of everything he represented, sure, but not Stark himself.

"But you're aware that--" He gestured at his chest and then hers.

She nodded again.

"And yet you somehow became employed at my company. It's like you wanted to keep close by, but not too close?"

Pepper pressed her lips together. "I was hired through a temp agency. When I first got the job, I couldn't exactly say no, not if I wanted to pay my bills. And then I liked the job, and since I'm just one accountant of many, it's usually pretty easy to avoid the big man up top."

"Fair enough." He took a deep breath before saying, "If you want, you can walk out that door, and we can pretend this never happened. But I think you should meet Rhodey first. You do have his name, too, don't you? James Rhodes, I mean."

"I do." She was not expecting the rush of relief she felt upon hearing that they were apparently an equilateral triangle.

"So? I promise, everything I am, he isn't."

Stark's tone seemed self-deprecating, but it was an odd statement. She frowned a little. "The only thing I know about him is that he's in the Air Force," she said.

"Yeah," Stark said. "He's . . . he's nice. Romantic. A good, upstanding citizen. A hero, really. I'm. I'm really not."

He seemed nervous, tapping a pen on his desk. Pepper really didn't know why he'd be nervous.

"Please, though," he said. "You'll like him. You really will."

Oh. He thought she'd been avoiding him specifically, as in, she didn't want to be soulmated to Tony Stark. It . . . was true, and it wasn't, but really, she didn't have time to coddle his ego right now. "I'll wait to meet him," she said.

"Good," he said, and his shoulders dropped about six inches. She hadn't even noticed them creeping up. Without looking away from her, he picked up the receiver of his phone and dialed something on speed dial. Hitting the speakerphone button, he replaced the handset and let the phone ring.

"This had better be important, Tony," Rhodes's voice said, bouncing around the room a little bit.

"Most important phone call of my life, Rhodey," Stark said. "Guess who's sitting on my couch right now."

"The president."

"Nope, more important than that."

"Tony, who on earth is more--oh."

"Yeah, _oh_."

"Virginia Potts? She's there?"

"Yeah. How fast can you get here?"

"Faster than is strictly legal," Rhodes said, with a shaky laugh. "Virginia? Ginny? You there?"

"It's Pepper, actually," she said.

"Pepper," Stark breathed.

"Pepper," Rhodes said, and he sounded as reverent as Stark looked. "I'll be there soon, I promise, baby. I won't make you wait any longer than you have to."

"See you soon, Rhodey," Stark said, and hastily ended the call. "Look, he didn't--"

"He meant it," Pepper said, interrupting him gently. "Don't worry about it."

"Yeah, okay." He tapped his pen on the desk for a moment again. "It's probably going to take him a while to get here, two or three hours. Do you want lunch? I can order something--or I can let you go back to your office, if you like. Just--don't leave, okay?"

"I don't have an office; I have a cubicle," she said. "And I'd rather sit here and eat whatever expensive food you're going to find than sit and worry in my cube, so sure." She looked behind her, saw the couch along the wall, and sat, crossing her legs primly.

(He watched, but it was only for a split second.)

Stark fumbled through ordering his own takeout; it was almost endearing, and she thought he was probably more competent when he hadn't been presented with a missing soulmate.

The food took about an hour to get there; Pepper managed to rustle up a copy of the paper and read it slowly, mostly ignoring Stark. Stark, for his own part, looked busy enough, reading some reports. Every thirty seconds he'd look up, like he was thinking about starting a conversation, but he caught himself every time.

"Shouldn't we go do something about Wilcox?" Pepper asked at some point.

"Nah, let him stew," Stark said. 

Rhodes got there about twenty minutes after Elena had removed the leftover takeout containers, still wearing camouflage; he stalked into Stark's office as if he owned it and looked around until he spotted Pepper. "There you are," he said, walking forward and holding his hands out. "We've been waiting for you."

"Rhodey, she doesn't--" Stark said, but Pepper cut him off.

"You're going to have to wait a little longer," she said, standing and holding out one hand for a handshake. "Hello. I'm Pepper Potts. I work in the Accounting department of Stark Industries."

Rhodes shook her hand, shooting a confused glance at Stark. "And you didn't know she was right under your nose the whole time? And you didn't want to--" The last part was directed at Pepper, who shook her head.

She owed them an explanation, at least part of one, she supposed, and swallowed reflexively before she started speaking, not entirely sure of what she was actually going to say. "You know what it's like, realizing at thirteen that your soulmate--one of your soulmates--is the heir to Stark Industries? I knew I could find him any time I wanted. I just wanted to--" She licked her lips, stalling because this was the hardest part. "I wanted to be my own person before I got subsumed into you two."

"And are you?" Rhodes asked.

Stark was leaning forward; she didn't know if he realized he was doing it.

"I don't know," Pepper said slowly, and Stark's face crumpled; Rhodes remained stoic. 

The thing about soulmates was that they weren't a guarantee; studies showed that there was something like a 96% rate of, at the very least, a successful long-term relationship, if not permanency. That still left four percent of cases in which it didn't work. Pepper knew that, but staring at Stark and Rhodes, who were both doing a terrible job of hiding how hopeful they were, there was really only one thing she could say.

"But, I think, maybe we can try."

Stark sagged with relief and closed the distance between himself and Rhodes, plastering himself along the other man's side. "I knew you'd tip the balance in our favor," he said.

Rhodes wrapped an arm around him and kissed him on the temple. "We've waited almost twenty years. What's another few months?"

"Torture, is what it is," Stark said, and Rhodes swatted him lightly on the side. "Anyway, you two talk. I have a VP to go fire."

***

Tony left without a backwards glance, leaving Rhodey with Pepper Potts. "I'm guessing you have questions," he said.

She just looked at him, eyes wide and very green, for a long moment, and then shrugged. "Nothing that can't wait." She sat down on the couch again, and Rhodey pulled out Tony's desk chair, the ridiculous ergonomic one that barely looked like a chair at all but was incredibly comfortable, and sat a few feet away from her.

"No reason to wait," he said, "unless you want to ask Tony anything in specific."

"Does everyone call you Rhodey?" she asked suddenly.

"Tony started it. My mother calls me Jim. You can call me either," he said.

She nodded. "And you and Tony have been together for twenty years?"

"Not quite," he said. "We went to MIT together and met when he was fifteen and I was almost eighteen." He felt compelled to add, "Nothing . . . happened until he was eighteen."

"I didn't say anything," she said, clearly trying not to smile. "So you two aren't exclusive?"

"Uh," Rhodey said, not entirely expecting that, although really, considering Tony's reputation, he probably should have. "We weren't, but we will be now."

She tilted her head to one side. "You mean, because of me."

He nodded.

"Why are you so sure this is going to work?" she asked, and then looked surprised, as if she hadn't known she was going to say that.

Of course, Rhodey wasn't sure how he was going to answer it. The truth was . . . it was squishy, and she was an accountant, which meant she'd probably like numbers and facts. Hell, he was an engineer; he understood. But he didn't have numbers, so he gave her what he had. "Tony and me, we've been together for a long time, and in the beginning it was just a hope and friendship between a couple of totally unlikely people."

Pepper nodded.

"But then--" And this was where it started to get odd. "--then, I guess, the relationship became a thing on its own, and it became clear when we--when we started having sex that we were only two-thirds of a whole." He looked over to see her reaction, and she still looked politely interested, so he continued. "And over the years, we kinda figured out the size and shape of the hole between us, or the third side of the triangle, if you want."

"And I fit?"

"You fit," he said.

"And you know that just by seeing me?"

"Sixteen years is a long time to think about it," Rhodey said.

"But what if I'm not--"

"You are," he said, and pushed a little bit of the Air Force Officer Voice into the two words.

"Don't," she said, and he didn't ask what she meant, because he knew.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I just--I _know_ , and Tony _knows_ , and we're both willing to give you what you need--time, space, answers--until you know, too. Whichever way it goes."

Pepper nodded. "Okay. Thank you, Rhodey."

"You're welcome, Pepper."

***

Pepper couldn't work for Stark Industries anymore, and it had nothing to do with VP Wilcox's firing; she just couldn't bring herself to be a low-level employee in the company run by her soulmate. Rhodey unsurprisingly supported her in this. "How many times have you tried to poach me from the Air Force, Tony? And how many times have I said no?"

"All of them," Tony said glumly.

Somehow Tony got Obadiah Stane to write her a ridiculously-glowing letter of recommendation, and within a few weeks she had a new job at the Getty Museum, helping supervise the renovation and eventual re-opening of the Getty Villa in Malibu. It was nice to be able to use her minor in art history, and even nicer not to worry about Tony Stark twenty-four hours a day.

(Eighteen or twenty, yes, but not twenty-four anymore.)

With that off her plate, Pepper agreed to low-key dating; Rhodey got a found-soulmate leave of absence from the Air Force. She could tell that the formality of the dating (nights at the opera; meals in public; careful walks along the beach) was wearing on the men, and she would be willing to bet a month of her new salary (much larger than the old one) that after the trio dates, Rhodey and Tony went home and fucked like rabbits.

(She didn't think about that too often.)

But then, one Saturday, they didn't have anything planned, but she . . . she wanted to see them. It was such a strange impulse that she couldn't see any reason not to obey it; she got in her car and drove to the house on the beach.

JARVIS, Tony’s AI, let her in through the gate and then in the front door; he told her that Tony and Rhodey were in the garage workshop and directed her in their direction. For a moment she regretted not changing before she left; she had on a blue collared shirt over a white tank top and jeans and it was all neat and clean, but she could have thrown on a sundress or something.

Going down the stairs to the workshop, though, all regrets flew out of her head; the men were both dressed much more casually than she was, as she could see through the glass wall. They were also covered in grease from head to toe, and Tony was frantically rubbing his hands clean on a shop rag. Considering that his ripped jeans and ratty black undershirt were also coated, it wasn't going to help that much.

Rhodey wasn't in much better condition; his gray MIT shirt showed the grime even more. On their right was a workbench with what looked like parts of a rocket strewn all over it. Out in the middle of some open floor space looked like a different rocket, partially exploded.

"Hey, Pepper," Rhodey said, once she'd gotten inside the door.

"Um, hi," Tony said. "If we'd have known we were having a visitor we would have tidied up the place a bit," he said, clearly trying to make a joke out of it.

"What are you working on?" Pepper stayed on the far side of the workbench, picking her footing around metal bits on the floor.

"Uh, blowing things up?" Tony said.

"It's Saturday," Rhodey said with a shrug. "We were bored."

And that was _it_ , whatever "it" was. Something clicked in Pepper's head, and she could see it, could see how the three of them fit together, and it was _amazing_.

"This is you," she said, gesturing around the room.

"Well. Yes? But that doesn't mean that the Armani and flight suits aren't, too." Tony shrugged helplessly and looked at Rhodey.

"You want to see the rocket we're making?" Rhodey said, sounding altogether too excited for an officer in the Air Force who was on the downward slope to forty.

"Now she's going to think we're both disasters," Tony said pointedly.

"Yes," Pepper said, cutting off Rhodey's response. "Yes, I want to see the rocket you're making."

She came around to the other side of the workbench to look at their half-assembled project, apparently "just a high-school aerospace camp type of rocket," as Tony said. Rhodey pointed out the basic components while Tony pointed out the stuff they'd added.

"And the second set of boosters fall off to--"

All of a sudden she couldn't resist, couldn't keep herself physically separate from them any longer and, heedless of her clean clothing, she threw herself into Tony's arms and kissed him.

He kissed her back heatedly for a long moment before pulling away with obvious reluctance. "Hey," he said, "you'll ruin your clothes--"

"Don't care," she said, wrapping one arm around his neck and holding the other one out to pull Rhodey in. "My new job pays well. I'll buy more."

For half a second, Tony thought about protesting, she could tell, but then the best look spread over his face, joy and love and wonder and _lust_ , and he leaned back in.

The little voice in the back of her head started screaming _complete! complete!_ and, for the first time, she agreed with it.

***

They did not have sex for the first time in Tony's workshop, but only because Rhodey retained a shred of common sense.

(That came later. Pepper looked _amazing_ spread over a freshly-cleaned workbench.)

Afterwards, lying with his head on Pepper's shoulder and his fingers entwined with Rhodey's, Tony asked, "What made you change your mind?"

"Your ass in those jeans," Pepper said sleepily, and Rhodey added a drawled, "mm-hm."

"Don't get me wrong," Tony said, "I like this new, uninhibited Pepper Potts, but my ass is fantastic in every pair of pants I own. So?" He nudged her jaw with the top of his head.

"Something was missing before," she said. "I found it."

"In the workshop?"

"Yes," she said. "Did you ever invite anyone else down there?"

"No, just the two of us--oh." And of course he'd told JARVIS she could go anywhere. "I mean, if that's all it would have taken, I would have invited you into the workshop _weeks_ ago."

"No," she said, reaching down to swat him on the ass. "That wasn't all. I had to put all the pieces of us together first."

"It's not going to be easy keeping all the pieces together," Tony said after a moment. "I feel I should warn you. I'm still a disaster."

"I know," she said. "That's why there's three of us. We're all disasters, but somehow it'll work out."

"You have a lot of faith, for someone who was desperately afraid to meet us a few short months ago." Tony winced even as he said it; he just couldn't keep his damn mouth shut.

"Shut up and let me enjoy the afterglow," Pepper said with another swat.

"Yes, ma'am," he said, and kissed her collarbone.

***

It wasn't easy. It wasn't simple. It was worth every moment. 

**Author's Note:**

> The director of the Getty Museum is [Timothy Potts](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Potts). I couldn't resist.
> 
> I adjusted Tony's age a little because otherwise during Spring Break, 1987, he would be not quite fourteen. Instead he's born in 1970; Rhodey of course is born in 1968. Pepper was born in 1976, and the accident happened in late 1988. 
> 
> Also, thanks to fake-jungle-oboe for this exchange (paraphrased): What would Tony Stark be like if he'd been soulmated to Rhodey the whole time? / Probably still a shithead, lol.


End file.
